Beautifully Unfinished
by Vanilla Princess Baby
Summary: "Do you think I wanted this? Do you think ever in my mind I thought I'd be where I am now? That I ever imagined that I'd be sitting on the steps of city hall with you and not even know you?" Set in 6B. When anxiety starts to resurface, there's still one person who can pull Spencer back when she's drowning. Oneshot.


**AN: I kind of just wrote this on the spot and wasn't even sure if I'd ever post it but. . . YOLO.**

 **For the record, I don't know much about panic attacks so this is pretty inaccurate and I took sort of a creative license so please don't read me the riot act for it not being factually correct.**

 **Because this show has waited 12 years to tell us how they broke up, I just made a headcanon and went with it. It'll be AU by 6x20 but that's fine.**

 **I intentionally left little indication towards Spaleb in here. It's mentioned once in passing but if I had it my way, it'd be wiped from everyone's memory.**

 **Read and review, my lovies.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own PLL. If I did, 6B would be very different.**

* * *

"I don't think I should be here," Spencer said to her mom for the thousandth time.

"Honey, the candidates' families need to be at the event today," Veronica reminded her as she fixed her sweater. "Just relax and don't fidget."

Ever since she woke up Spencer had been feeling off, like a ticking time bomb. Maybe that had to do with the fact she got twenty minutes of sleep, half because she and the girls had driven six miles out of Rosewood to try and catch their stalker, at nearly two in the morning and half because once she was back inside the barn, she was unable to sleep.

Lately her nightmares, the things haunted her for years and never completely went away, had been in full force. Every night now she flew up in bed, gasping and trembling. Now she wasn't even able to fall asleep.

 _It's happening again,_ the little voice in her head shouted. _Just like last time._

Spencer shook her head, trying to shake off the bad thoughts. She was fine. She was older, she was smarter and she wouldn't let herself get consumed into this mess like she once had. She wouldn't let this mess consume her.

Her mom brought her back to reality. "Wait," She held up a hand and pulled out her phone, texting someone. Spencer patiently watched as her mother slide the phone back into her pocket before evaluating her and moving a stray hair. "Okay, just remember, don't talk to anyone Gil tells you not to and run over all your answers with him beforehand."

Of course, the day she felt tired and anxious was the day her mom had another event. Spencer, who's job relied on knowing these things, didn't even ask what kind of event or why they were going to it. Lately she felt a lot like a doll, positioned and controlled by the campaign workers, told what to do and how to do it, having her strings pulled like a puppet and the connotation dolls held from her teen years forced Spencer to take a deep breath or she would go off the edge and have full-fledged panic attack.

Veronica walked up the stairs to city hall, where the event was being held, poised and in control, and for a split second Spencer wondered if this was what she looked like to others. If when outsiders looked at her, did they see the little girl who was beaten and throttled and broken beyond total repair or did they see a woman who knew what she was doing, who was powerful and smart and came to win?

Spencer looked immediately for Gil upon entering the building, just like her mother told her to, just like the dutiful daughter she supposedly was now. What Spencer didn't expect to find upon entering was her ex-boyfriend and his new girl.

Toby and Yvonne stood talking to someone Spencer had seen at all the recent gatherings. Reporter, probably. Correction: Yvonne stood talking to a reporter. Toby just stood there as her arm candy and smiled every so often.

She knew it was ridiculous, as she'd moved on too, but something about seeing Toby with anyone else made her ache deep inside in ways she never wanted to admit. It was harder than she thought, to see him give the affection that once had gone to her to someone else.

But he was happy. And that's all she really wanted. His happiness was worth more than most things to her. No matter how she felt in return.

"Spencer," Her mother prodded warningly. "Sweetie, Gil is talking to you."

Spencer snapped out of her trance apologetically. "Oh my god, I'm sorry," She fumbled, something she rarely ever did. She had to shut her eyes to calm herself once again. Her anxiety went hand and hand with sleep deprivation. And with stalkers.

Gil carried on as if Spencer was giving him her full attention, motioning in different directions, towards different reporters. When he was done speaking, he didn't ask if she had caught what he said-she didn't-but instead moved on and started heading towards a group of mid-forties, pulling out his blackberry.

"What's wrong with you today?" Veronica asked, her focus zeroed in on her daughter for once.

Her words, once upon a time, would have caused Spencer to lash out and shut down. But, whether time had softened Veronica or had molded Spencer into someone closer to what her parents intended her to be, her mom's words didn't elicit much of a reaction outside of a shrug and a small smile.

"Alright, forget what Gil said and stay with me," Her mom put an hand on her back and guided her in direction of the first reporter. A late twenties man with a clean shave that reeked of Hollister cologne.

Spencer tried, she really did, to pay attention to her mom's interviews. Every so often she added in a word here or there. But the entire event felt off to her, like she was still in a dream. She looked around for something to stabilize her, to hold her to this moment and not let her drift away.

The only thing that remotely calmed her was the face of her ex-boyfriend.

Funny how even after all this time, he was still her stabilizing influence. She watched him as Yvonne talked with confidence and knowledge, the way Spencer should be talking too. But she noticed he never opened his mouth. He never said a word or contributed anything besides the warm, placid smile on his face that he showed everyone Yvonne came into contact with.

Her mom guided her to the next set of reporters, this time a variety of ages. One nearly forty, another no older than Toby. They were two feet away from Yvonne and Toby's conversation and Spencer could hear now exactly what Yvonne was saying.

"I think the real reason people my age don't vote is they aren't interested enough. They don't think politics apply to them." The bubbly girl said with a smile at her boyfriend as he gave her a nod of support.

His hand rested on Yvonne's upper waist, never once moving. For a split second Spencer remembered his large hands holding her waist and tracing patterns when she got nervous or scared, even when she refused to outright admit to him that she was less than okay. She needed that now.

"How do you feel about what happened to Charlotte Dilaurentis?" Spencer wondered for a moment why Yvonne would get asked such a question until she realized the question was for her.

Spencer snapped her eyes to the young reporter in front of her, shocked and caught completely off guard. She looked at her mom, whose expression was a facade of calm, staring back at her. "Uh," She struggled after a minute before trying to take a deep breath and then another but neither were deep enough for her.

Before she could fumble out a response, another voice, one she hadn't heard all event spoke up. "Why would you ask her that?" Toby demanded.

The reporter looked at Toby and held his tape recorder in his general direction. "I was just curious. She was partially responsible for Charlotte's release from Radley-"

Spencer felt her chest get tighter at his words. "You don't ask the girl she tortured how she feels about her murder," Toby exclaimed, disbelieving.

"Toby," Yvonne said gently, smiling placidly at the two reporters she was in a conversation with.

"Okay," Veronica intervened, waving a hand between Toby and the reporter. "This question was not appropriate. Please redact it."

Spencer didn't hear anymore as she pulled away from the group, feeling the air being squeezed out of her lungs and feeling like she was going to pass out. "Spencer, what happened?" Gil inquired, witnessing the entire spectacle.

She struggled to speak before giving up on it, trying to avoid more stares than she was already getting as she gasp for breath.

"Spencer," Another voice chimed in.

"T-Toby," Spencer shook her head, feeling herself shaking.

"What's wrong with her?" Gil asked him as if Spencer was an invalid.

"She's having a panic attack," Toby stated irately before placing a hand on her back.

"Could you take her out?" Her mom's campaign coordinator asked as if she was an embarrassment to him.

Toby didn't respond, he just wrapped an arm around his ex-girlfriend and guided her gently but swiftly out of the building and down the concrete steps.

As soon as fresh air hit her, she felt slightly better, able to pull away from Toby's support and attempt to regain her balance against the railing.

But he didn't get up and go away once she could support herself. A crazed gunman couldn't have pulled him away from her in that moment.

"Spence," He whispered and she could have sworn for a moment she was eighteen again and he was her safe place to land and whenever she felt alone, all he had to do is put his arms around her and she was home. "Spence," He said again, so soft it felt like a caress.

She shut her eyes to block out the pain, the feeling of terror that consumed her entire life, the constant state of anxiety she was forced into in her formative years, the never ending shaky hands and tension headaches.

His hands which until now he'd refrained from using to comfort her, found her upper arms like instinct, like a magnetic pull he couldn't stop. And instantly, she was back inside his loft, eighteen and the poster girl for trauma, and she could feel his hands rubbing her back after waking up from a nightmare, she could feel his chest against hers as they laid together on his futon and watched old movies in hopes they put her to sleep, she could feel what it felt like to feel safe again, to feel like no matter what, this still was enough, this could protect her, there was a reason to keep going, no matter how bad things got or how much of her was taken in the process, there were two arms that'd always hold her and tell her everything was okay.

She didn't have that anymore and suddenly, that was her breaking point. She was over the edge and she couldn't breathe and her chest was on fire and the world was spinning and she couldn't breathe.

She'd felt like this a million times before. She'd had more panic attacks than she could count on two hands. She closed her eyes and focused all her energy on not vomiting, searching for anything in her brain to keep her afloat.

She flipped through all the faces and the people she loved. The ones who made her life worth living. The ones she'd fight for. The ones who had a pull on her, enough of one to pull her back when she was spinning off the edge.

One face in particular clouded up her mind, the pull stronger than the rest, even if they hadn't been an 'us' in three years.

She remembered what it was like to be pulled back by Toby. How just being with him was enough to bring her solace. How it felt to lie in bed and feel him sound asleep behind her, his face in her hair, his arm, heavy in his slumber, slung across her waist, pulling her back to his chest. To feel his heart beat against her shoulder blade and know that it was all the sound she needed to get through whatever she was forced to face in her day. How it felt to know that whatever she needed, he'd give it, no questions asked.

She remembered the summer after Cece was revealed, how the feeling of being watched didn't go away, how she still laid in her bed wide awake and restless, how the words _"choose one or all will suffer"_ played like an anthem on repeat every time she shut her eyes. But for every bad moment of that summer, she had something to be grateful for.

When she woke up to the door closed in her bedroom, a mistake her mom carelessly made, and she cried out, paralyzed and chained to her bed, convinced she was still captive in the dollhouse and everything after that had been a delirious dream. Toby had left work only forty five minutes into his shift, to sit on the floor of her bedroom and rock her until she could breathe.

When she had gone to the world's most awkward family dinner at the Cavanaugh's, as Toby's moral support, only to later learn Angela Cavanaugh, Toby's step mother, had forgotten pay the power bill. The entire house had gone pitch black, and Spencer could still hear herself scream and scream until her lungs bled and she was gagging. Toby's arms had been around her the entire time, his fingers combing through her hair, no matter how loud she was or how badly she was hurting his ears.

When she woke up at two thirty in the morning during one of their sleepovers, starving after forgoing dinner for sex, realized there was little food in his loft and begged Toby to drive to the closest 24 hour diner in the county, located 15 minutes outside of Rosewood. He drove without complaint and didn't say a word when she ordered four different entrees, even though they both knew it was all a reaction to being starved in the dollhouse. Afterwards, when she admitted how irrational she was for making him go to all that trouble, he'd wordlessly wrapped his arms around her and kissed her neck.

The only thing every moment that summer had in common was the feeling of two arms wrapping around her, pulling her into a warm embrace, giving her permission to burrow into him and cling like he was a lifeline. She gripped onto that feeling so tight and so hard, it grounded her back in reality, the way it always had before. As if he was really holding her.

She held onto the memory with every ounce of strength in her body, until she had the courage to open her eyes again and reenter her life, like the bulldozer she was meant to be.

Until she realized it was more than a memory. Somewhere in her panic attack, in her shakiness, in her paralysis, Toby had encircled her like not a day had past since she'd left, and he was holding her the way only he knew how.

He rocked her back and forth, slowly, as if he alone could mend her bleeding heart. He couldn't, not even when they were dating, and yet it never stopped him from trying.

She choked out a few words here and there but none made sense or registered in either one of their minds. He just held her and let her wrinkle his button down shirt, her hands gripping it in her sobs.

His fingers ran through her hair, his hand rubbed her back in circles, slow and soothing. "Please," She whispered finally, her voice a croaky alto.

 _Please, don't let me go. Not yet. I know you have a girlfriend and I'm no longer the love of your life and I know I'm not single and I know things aren't what they used to be but I need you. I never need anyone and I need you. I need you to hold me and tell me everything will be alright._

She could never say those words out loud, never make her mouth say anything that made her feel so exposed, and yet, as she grabbed another fistful of his shirt, she feverishly hoped he knew, deep down.

"Please," She whispered again and he pulled her tighter.

"I'm here, Spence," He whispered into her hair, cradling the back of her head. "I'm here for you."

She didn't know how much longer they stood there, holding each other the way no platonic friends should ever hold each other, but eventually Spencer pulled away, dropped her arms from his back and swallowed hard on the lump in her throat. She didn't have to look him in the eye to know his chest ached at the sight of her red, puffy face.

She wiped her hand across her cheek, trying to wipe the smudged makeup away without making a bigger mess. His fingers replaced her and he wiped the mascara from under her lower lashes, erasing evidence of her breakdown.

"I'm sorry," She finally said, looking at the ground.

He gave her a look that she recognized all too well. "You're sorry for crying, Spencer?" He asked softly, smiling in spite of himself. "Really?"

She shrugged, still analyzing the steps, letting out something between a laugh and a sob. "I don't know."

"Hey," He put his fingers on her face and a shiver involuntarily ran up her spine. "Don't be embarrassed," He said quietly but firmly when she met his eyes. "If I were you, I'd be curled up in a corner somewhere, unable to function."

"No," She disagreed, the loudest she'd spoken to him all day. "You wouldn't. You're the strongest person I know, Toby. You rebuilt your life, on you own, from scratch, with no one in your corner."

His expression softened at her words. "I had you in my corner."

"I'm not exactly an asset."

"Don't say that," He shook his head. "Don't tear yourself down."

"Toby-"

"I'm in awe of you, Spence. Still, after all this time, I can't believe that someone could pick themselves up after being tortured mercilessly for years. You don't just function in the world, you thrive."

Spencer rolled her eyes though she wasn't exactly sure why. "I don't have much of a choice. My parents expect-"

"It's not because of them. Your success isn't because of your family. Everything you are is _in spite_ of them."

Spencer twitched her mouth, touched by the words. "I don't thrive, Toby. Okay, two minutes ago I was sobbing on your shoulder, having a full fledged panic attack. I wouldn't call that a success."

Toby laughed once, shaking his head. "You still have these expectations for yourself that God himself could not meet. There isn't a person, on this planet, who wouldn't have a meltdown here and there if they were repeatedly tortured for two years of their life and then, just when they got their life together, the person comes back."

Spencer snapped her neck up at his words. "What did you just say?" Toby was analyzing her facial expression, like a scientist looking through a microscope. "You know about… this new person?"

"I do now."

She gaped at him, unable to speak once again. "How?" Her voice came out demanding, sharp as a knife in the drop of a hat.

He looked at her for a long time, his expression unafraid. "Because I know you."

She was still reeling as he sat down on the concrete steps. He didn't say another word for a long time, didn't offer another explanation, he just waited until she sat down next to him to speak.

"Why didn't you come to me with this?" He asked, gentle as a lamb but Spencer could hear his hurt under his calm facade.

She blew all the air out of her lungs through her nose twice before answering. "I just want you to be happy," It wasn't an answer and yet, somehow it was.

"I just want you to be okay," He replied, desperation in his voice. "I hate when you refuse to let me help you."

"Toby," She sighed again, burying her face in her hands. "You have to stop."

"Stop what?" He asked, genuinely confused.

"Stop acting like your girlfriend isn't inside the building behind us!" Spencer exclaimed. "Stop acting like we're still on the same side! Stop acting like… " She trailed off, unable to say the words that were on her tongue.

Because once she said them he could dispute it.

"Like?"

 _Like you're still in love with me. Like I'm still the one person in this world that matters most to you. Like you'd still do anything to protect me._

"It doesn't matter! What matters is that you don't let me poison your life again!"

"No, what matters is _your_ life! What matters is that you get the life you always wanted!"

"Do you think I wanted this?" Spencer yelled, gesturing between them before she could stop herself. "Do you think ever in my mind I thought I'd be where I am now? That I ever imagined that I'd be sitting on the steps of city hall with you and _not even know you_?" Her words silenced him completely. Whatever else he wanted to say was no longer important.

"Spencer," He breathed.

"You don't even know who I am anymore."

"That's what happens in a break up."

"No, that's what happens when you refuse to leave behind the town that tortured both of us! You chose to stay here, Toby! You chose it over me, when you promised you'd come with me!"

"I was scared! What was I going to do in Georgetown? Sit around your dorm room while you became the first woman president? I had nothing there!"

" _I_ was there!" She yelled, her eyes growing big and her voice more guttural than it had been in close to three years.

"Spencer," He whispered again, burying his face in his palm now.

"Go ahead," She said despondently. "Go."

Toby raised his head out of his hand, looking at her confused. "What?"

"Go!" She gestured towards the street and sidewalk in front of them. "This is the part where you leave!"

Toby sighed again and wiped his hand across his face. "I'm that predictable, huh?"

"You were contemplating it. Weren't you?"

Toby didn't answer right away but when she didn't continue he finally said, "Yes."

"Reason five hundred why we didn't work out."

He gave her a sardonic look. "Yeah, sorry but if my leaving was the reason we didn't work out, we wouldn't have made it three months."

"So Yvonne doesn't mind you constantly taking off?" Spencer asked, her sass full fledged now.

He shrugged, unruffled by her tone. "She doesn't seem to be too bothered by it."

"I guess she's less of a bitch than I am."

 _Good,_ the serious part of her mind, the part that hated her from the inside out, chimed. _He deserves to be happy. He deserves to be with someone like him. Sweet and kind and understanding._

"Spencer," He said in the tone he always said her name, half exasperated, half a sigh, but always with an undertone of affection.

"Seriously. From what I can see, you really traded up." As she spoke the sarcasm faded from her voice. "I bet she would never lie to you. . . Not like I did. And never be the reason you get hurt. . . . Never inflict so much pain on you. . . Never put you in a position where you had to go against who you are."

"Stop," He said so soft she barely registered it. Her words cut through him harder than any shout or scream could have.

"I'm sorry, Toby, that I wasn't the girl you deserved. I'm glad you've found her now."

"Please, don't say that," He reached for her hand, as if it was still second nature. "You were my…" He cut himself off before he could say what he was thinking, fully aware that it was inappropriate to say to his ex.

Spencer blinked back her tears before changing the subject. "I'll figure out what to do about this new -A, okay? You don't need to worry. Go, live your life with Yvonne. You deserve that."

The words, though she meant them, were so hard for her to say. He knew what it cost her to tell him that. "I'm never going to just walk away, Spencer, when there is someone out there that wants to hurt you," He swore. "Ever."

"You should," she whispered.

"I won't."

"Why not?" She asked, legitimate curiosity in her voice. "Why can't you just let it go? It no longer concerns you."

"I'm not going to let you get hurt. Not without doing everything in my power to help you. I was there last time and if this new person is anything like Charlotte-"

"You don't even know anything about this new enemy," Spencer retorted.

"If they text and torment, I think that's all I have to know."

"Why are you willing to stop loving me but you're not willing to stop protecting me?" She blurted out, frustrated.

"I think you know the answer to that, Spence."

"No, actually I don't." She cringed inwardly at her own words. She felt like she was repeatedly putting her foot in her mouth and stamping desperate on her forehead.

Toby didn't respond for a long time, quietly taking in her words. "You really never fully grasped how much I loved you."

 _Past tense._

"You were my entire world. Everything I did, I did with you in mind. You seem to think you dragged me down but in reality you were all I had to keep me going. I would have given you the heart out of my own chest if you needed it. Without thinking twice. But you refused to ever need anything. Our problem was you couldn't let someone else carry any part of the burden for you. But I would have carried it. I would have carried it entirely if you had let me."

"I never wanted your life to be all about saving me."

"My life wasn't all about _saving_ you, Spencer," Toby amended in an even voice, though he almost looked like he wanted to shake her around. "My life was just about you in general. Being with you. Doing things for or with you. Loving you."

 _Present tense._

"I'm not going to sit on my hands while someone tries to hurt you. Even after everything that happened between us, I think you know that already."

 _Everything that happened between us. Everything that was so wrong and so right. Everything we once were. Everything we could have been. Everything we lost. Everything we should have been._

"I'm sorry, Toby," Spencer whispered but she didn't even know what she was apologizing for now. For lying to him, once again? For getting with his best friend? For breaking up with him three years ago? For not being what she wished she could have been for him? For being so angry and so in love with him that she couldn't see straight? For not being able to even understand what she was doing every time she was around him anymore? For desperately wanting to change and still falling back into old habits?

Whatever she was apologizing for, he accepted it. "I have no regrets," He said amicably as he moved to stand up. "There's not a chapter of our story I would change."

 _I love you._ The words sat on her lips, screaming to be spoken but before she could say it, Yvonne appeared.

"Spencer!" She exclaimed, rushing up to hug her. "Are you okay?"

Spencer nodded, trying to appear as pleasant as possible. "Yeah, sorry, I'm just a little claustrophobic," She smiled brightly-or as brightly as Spencer Hastings could smile.

Yvonne said something else but Spencer's hearing was cut by the feeling of her heart sinking into her stomach as Toby's hand found it's way to the small of Yvonne's back.

"Spencer?" The other girl waved her hand in front of her face, taking her back to reality.

"Huh?"

"I asked if you were feeling faint," The darker girl looked concerned now, searching the outpouring crowd for Spencer's mom. "Toby, could go try to go find Veronica?" Yvonne asked her boyfriend.

"I'm fine," Spencer brushed off with a wave of her hand. "You guys go, I can find my mom or Gil. I don't need a babysitter, I'm good."

"Are you sure?" Yvonne asked but Toby's expression was the one Spencer was paying attention to.

"Yeah, I can take care of myself."

Toby shut his eyes at her words, clearly hearing the double meaning, before tugging on his girlfriend's waist. "We have to meet your dad anyway," He murmured as he guided her down the steps and away from the tornado of the girl he once called his.

Spencer watched them walk away, until they were lost in the crowd that had swarmed out in her oblivion. Even then, her eyes followed him.

The boy she once loved with all her heart. The boy who she'd given her heart to and who had never really returned it. She watched them walk away and she knew the devotion he still had to her couldn't change everything that went wrong between them. But it didn't matter to her. Not anymore.

He was the person who had showed her, when everyone else failed, that there was good in the world. That there was good inside of her. That people can change in ways you never imagined. That hope doesn't always breed eternal misery. Putting her hope in Toby Cavanaugh was the best thing she had ever done.

He was the person who had loved her when she couldn't even love herself. The person she never worried about being a disappointment to. The person who would do anything in his power to help her, even if he didn't always understand her. The person she would do anything for, no matter who she had to hurt.

Spencer watched Yvonne walk away with the boy they both loved and she didn't know if it made her happy or sad to know he was better off with someone else. She was past caring how it made her feel. She just wanted him to be happy. If anyone deserved to find bliss, it was Toby.

She didn't even realize she was crying until her mom pulled her into the bathroom.


End file.
